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bikram yoga: a lot of teaching class, taking class, and confusion on how much and when to eat


Penguin

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hi all! I am a bikram yoga teacher who teaches nine or so classes a week, and takes four or five classes a week. also I am very physically active outside of yoga, hiking and/or walking almost daily. I successfully completed a whole30 in the month of march. i really didn't lose much weight but I FELT amazing, and I am convinced that this is the way of life for me! long story short, I went to hawaii for most of the month of April and went hog wild with non compliant food. since returning home I have struggled to get back on track. I am starting another whole30 this week with the hope of getting back to feeling good again. my question is that i. am concerned about getting enough food but not too much. I desperately want to lose about 15 lbs but my health is more important to me than weight loss and I don't want to eat too little. with a history of disordered eating I struggle to feel what is "full", when my body has had enough food. I'm also wondering if I need pre and post workout meals? bikram is much more strenuous than most other yoga but I'm just not sure.... here's what a typical day would look like: breakfast- two eggs scrambled with onions and mushrooms over spinach with two tbsp almond butter. lunch- eight oz of chicken with broccoli, cauliflower, mushrooms, peppers, onion, half an avocado

dinner- six oz filet mignon, romaine lettuce, carrots, cucumber, handful of olives. I also supplement with fish oil, digestive enzymes, natural calm, vit d....

my last question is about timing. about four nights a week I teach classes from four until eight thirty... normally I get home at nine thirty, have my last meal and go to bed. this feels late to me to be having my last meal especially right before bed but what else can I do? although teaching bikram is not as strenuous as taking bikram ( by a long shot!) I do use a lot of physical energy and I can't see eating my last meal at four and then nothing till morning.

sorry this is so long winded! basically I'm wondering am I eating enough? how can I know if I'm eating enough for good health but not so much that I won't lose any weight? should I be eating my last meal so close to bed?

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I would definitely eat that last meal after yoga regardless of bedtime.

I would love to take Bikram. Where I live we only have Baptiste (90 degree vinyasa) and I love it, but, oh, Bikram, I crave it.

There are so many factors to weightloss that aren't just calories in/energy out. Sleep, stress, possibly being at a healthy weight already, hormones. I too **think** I'd like to lose @13 lbs but I don't allow that to be my main motivation in food selection/avoidance. I have bigger issues, gut health, emotional stability. I trust my body to decide my size and I trust myself to feed myself appropriately. I don't always get it just right but W30 has changed my relationship with food to a degree that I know I am constantly moving toward better health and ideal body comp.

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I agree that you definitely need to fuel your workouts. Bikram is effing INTENSE. And you're doing a lot of classes a week.

Do you actually need to lose weight, or do you have unrealistic expectations about your body? I ask this because it might help you prioritize and figure out what will best serve you.

The scenarios I can envision--with very little knowledge of your situation--are:

1. Your last 15 pounds are phantom, and you should just keep doing what you're doing and enjoy where you're at;

2. You could stand to lose some belly fat (if that's where it is) and all that bikram and other activity is setting your stress hormones on fire. Your body's response is to hold onto its fat stores for dear life. The way to lose it would be to scale back the activity, increase sleep, and increase stress reduction.

My suggesting number two may really piss you off, and I get that. I got addicted to Bikram and thought it was doing me so much good because of the high I felt afterward--which also felt like calm--and how strong I was getting. I'm still serious about yoga, but now I mix it up and avoid any form of hot yoga in which the room's temperature is turned up and the practice is excessively fiery. I've learned through studying ayurveda that while I LOVE and am drawn to that kind of yoga, it's my deranged Pitta that makes me crave the opposite of what I actually need. When I do more calming practices (Yin, even, which used to drive me nuts) as well as slow-method weight lifting, walking, bike riding, and some burst training, I do better. I'm still a work in progress, though!

Anyway, I could be totally projecting here, so I don't want to say this is necessarily your experience or prescribe what you should do. But I thought sharing my experience might help.

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AbbeyG -

Your meal sizes look good. I might push for some more starchies in there since your yoga schedule is so intense. Add in a sweet potato or some squash with a meal or two. As for timing, I might try to work a big meal in at your 4 o'clock time and then go for something smaller before bed. But, if you're doing well eating post yoga, that's a fine option too.

Those last 15 lbs can be stubborn, it's true. Your best chance of success comes from focusing on 3 meals a day (excepting your pre-post-workout meals) with protein, veggies and fat. You may also want to consider toning down some of that activity and focusing on sleep (as was suggested above). The stress of focusing on that weight is likely hindering your progress already :)

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thank you ladies for your thoughtful responses! I think you all may be hitting the nail on the head when you say I need to dial back my yoga schedule a bit....something in me said "yes" when I read that! I REALLY don't want to but I think you are right, lol.....I guess I'm going to focus on really dialing in the rest of program (sleep, stress, etc) and see where that gets me. I'll focus on ideal health and then hopefully hotness will be a pleasant side effect!!!! @lady m- I am SO pitta! I laughed when I saw your yin suggestion, I force yin unpon myself once a week because I know it's good for me but it makes me crazy!

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Yeah. Ditto Moluv and Lady M. Wise women, they are.

Last week I had an expiring monthly yoga pass and had to take the Tues eve class bc I couldn't make my usual night. I was like, "waste of time class, grumble grumble, too slow, may as well sleep."

It was just exactly what I needed. It wasn't a fast flow class like I usually prefer. It was slow and we held the poses for a long time. (Which I know you do in Bikram, but I generally find the breath/movement of vinyasa best for my brain and so am not used to that at all.) I was actually quite sore the next day, and had a blissful sleep afterward.

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